Posted
by
timothy
on Tuesday July 16, 2013 @07:44AM
from the no-crisis-if-the-missiles-are-moving-that-direction dept.

HonorPoncaCityDotCom writes "BBC reports that a North Korean-flagged ship carrying suspected 'sophisticated missile equipment' bound from Cuba to North Korea has been stopped near Manzanillo on the Atlantic side of the canal. President Ricardo Martinelli said the authorities were checking the ship for drugs when they found the suspected weapons in containers of brown sugar. Experts believe the communist state is working towards developing a nuclear warhead small enough to put on a long-range missile. Under UN sanctions, North Korea is banned from weapons exports and the import of all but small arms. The 35-member crew have been detained, including the captain who the Panamanian president said tried to kill himself during the search. Security Minister Jose Raul Mulino said the ship 'aroused suspicion by the violent reaction of the captain and the crew.' Martinelli also published a photograph that appeared to show two large green containers, adding that the arms shipment had been uncovered 'in containers underneath a cargo of sugar.'"Also at the New York Times.

They can but they can not go through Panamanian waters to do so. It probably would have raised suspicions to go around the cape and thus stay in international waters could have just used a bigger ship that would not fit.

What was this fact downmodded? Because it sounds anti-American? The US government created Panama out of land it stole from Colombia and is in change of all of Central America. What's the beef in stating that?

Aside from that, the shippers were pretty dumb to try to take contraband through the canal. Oh well...

Ortega is a puppet. If he doesn't do what he is told, he will be removed, kind of like what happened to Noriega and Zelaya from Honduras. I mean, has he accomplished land reform of any kind, or do anything to reduce the power of foreign 'investors'? As far as I'm concerned he's a stooge for the CIA, smuggling contraband and laundering money. As it is, he does serve a purpose, even if only for propaganda to justify US meddling in the region. The US is in complete control..

You assume the sugar would be going to the general people. Jim Jong-Un was planning on baking lots of cookies. To share with Dennis Rodman on his next visit.

Jim Jong-Un is the greatest baker in the world. Great chefs from around the world come to North Korea to get his cookie making advice. His cookies are so great, flour and sugar come to North Korea on their own just to be in his cookies.

Jim Jong-Un is the greatest baker in the world. Great chefs from around the world come to North Korea to get his cookie making advice. His cookies are so great, flour and sugar come to North Korea on their own just to be in his cookies.

Not really, I doubt Cuba has some magic missile parts factory, these were missiles being laundered from Russia to NK through Cuba. I'm sure China is a bit pissed at the Kremlin at the moment since the last thing they want is NK stirring up political problems while they are trying to keep their economy from going off the deep end.

Unless these are cold war missiles no longer owned by Russia or forgot about by Russia, in which case Cuba had control of them. Russia probably isn't crazy enough to give nukes to NK, but Cuba may be. It may not even be functional. NK just needed something to base new designs off of.

North Korea and Russia share a border. There's no reason for them to attempt what you're suggesting.

Welcome to plausible deniability.

Israeli made weapons based on US designs are sold to Mujahadeen via 3rd parties (I.E. in Jordan, Pakistan). Russia does the same through other deniable parties, so does France (HTF do you think dictators get Exocet missiles). Mostly it's just excess stock and end of life weapons, but a 80's era mortar is still good for blowing up Infidels/Communists/Enemy of your choosing today.

You don't need this if they can be driven directly to NK undetected. They could easily be hidden from satellites with other trucks in normal trade. Again, I'd argue that there's no logical reason to do what was suggested.

In the real Cuban missile crisis you had American soldiers manning missiles that were a few minutes away from Moscow. One country the missiles was in, is called Turkey.

What's good for the goose (Americans putting missiles just over the border from the USSR) should be good for the gander (Russians putting missiles just over the border from the USA). But nope. More Americunt Exceptionalism.

You sound surprised that the US tried to leverage geographic and political advantages during an era of tensions and proxy conflicts that, for the first time in human history, could wipe out civilization and possibly even the species, if it escalated. So yeah, damned right we didn't play fair. Even in hindsight, damned glad we did given that the Soviets built a Doomsday device (Dead Hand).

The Dead Hand was not a doomsday device. Modern accounts describe it as semi-automatic, with a group of people who had the final decision. In this respect it was no different than the US putting nuclear weapons on submarines. In fact, it was likely developed in response to the Trident C4/D5 missiles which were accurate enough that the US would be able to effectively cripple Soviet high command with a limited nuclear strike.

The Dead Hand, as you describe, was a semi-automatic system to protect against a decapitation first strike by the US. Basically, there was a NORAD-like bunker buried in a mountain with a hotline to the Kremlin, from which their nuclear launches were managed. Normally a nuclear launch would require separate authorizations from the head of state and a senior military commander. But if the line to the Kremlin went dead, and a network of seismic sensors detected events characteristic of nuclear detonations, con

I mean, what about the ships clever enough to *not* take the Panama Canal - and follow the longer path? IOT, how many ships did we miss and How close NK is to having a working nuke?

I'll speculate here. A Hong Kong based company won a 25 year contract (still in force as far as I know) to mange container operations in the canal, so I'm guessing that the boat and its North Korean masters probably assumed basically China (let's be realistic here - Hong Kong does what China wants) was running the show there and a North Korean boat would be given a nod and a wink in terms of its cargo inspection. It could also be that the boat captain took this on himself to shorten the journey making the assumption that I previously mentioned and this was something he did on his own, so he tried to kill himself when it became clear that his cargo was going to be found. Remember that although Cuba seems to have violated the UN agreement that nothing at all will be done to them in punishment.

I'm guessing that the boat and its North Korean masters probably assumed basically China (let's be realistic here - Hong Kong does what China wants) was running the show there and a North Korean boat would be given a nod and a wink in terms of its cargo inspection.

And the fact that this didn't happen indicates that China is giving NK's leash a firm tug, I assume?

...so he tried to kill himself when it became clear that his cargo was going to be found. Remember that although Cuba seems to have violated the UN agreement that nothing at all will be done to them in punishment.

I think the ship's master is more concerned about the punishment from the cargo owners than the UN.

You are working from the assumption Panama stumbled across this, rather than spies knowing it ahead of time.

How to take advantage of knowledge only a spy could know is a grand strategy game. In WWII, the allies had planes "stumble" over German ships they knew about from cracked codes, that they really needed to take out, but didn't wanna show their hand at deep knowledge.

Yep. This isn't the first time customs agents for various countries have "accidentally" stumbled across North Korean contraband. It's a no-brainer to conclude that US intelligence agencies are responsible.

I would hope the answer is 'No'. Not after that little incident in 1962 anyway. I would hope that the CIA/NSA/Pentagon would make it their business to know exactly what kind of military technology is moving into/out of that country. Or they are not doing their f*king job, in my opinion.

Screw looking for online porn and tax havens. Keep an eye on the people with the nukes.

I would hope the answer is 'No'. Not after that little incident in 1962 anyway. I would hope that the CIA/NSA/Pentagon would make it their business to know exactly what kind of military technology is moving into/out of that country. Or they are not doing their f*king job, in my opinion.

Screw looking for online porn and tax havens. Keep an eye on the people with the nukes.

Maybe you haven't heard. But the NSA has had their hands full spying on American citizens.

...has been stopped near Manzanillo on the Atlantic side of the canal. President Ricardo Martinelli

Which country is Manzanillo in? Which canal are we talking about? Which country is Ricardo Martinelli the El Presidente of?

And no, it isn't bleedin' obvious, nor should it matter even if it is. The point of "journalism" - loosely applied to Slashdot though it is - is to inform the reader, not have them play fill-in-the-blanks.

Experts believe the communist state is working towards developing a nuclear warhead

Which of the two communist states previously mentioned is now being referred to? If you can make it clearer without wasting the reade

This has to be the first case where someone read the summary but skipped the title before posting. Usually it's "read the title, post, argue, insult, check summary to see if the other guy had a point, curse Slashdot for not giving you an edit function to change your old posts."

Soon even Panama's expanding canal for "Superpanamax" ships won't be the only one. China is building an even bigger one next door for even larger ships.

Meanwhile environmentalists in the US fight deepening harbors for even just the Superpanamax ships. The center of empire has shifted. It's all over. China has learned the lesson of history -- keep the trade routes open.

You shouldn't be pedantic if you didn't bother to read the headline (nearly identical in TFS and TFA, but they both mention Panama). Since this is Slashdot, you can't be blamed for not reading TFA (the Beeb one), which does attribute the claim to "Panama's president" in literally the first 2 words.

This is a waveguide for a SNR-75 "Fan Song" fire-control radar for the Russian SA-2 (NATO) missile system. You can learn about it here (an SNR-75 set abandoned in Czechoslovakia): http://forum.valka.cz/viewtopic.php/t/74858

And you can see the waveguide cone pictured in the AP stories and twitter here:http://forum.valka.cz/attachments/1945/RSN-75M3_Fan_Song_E_1.jpg

And unless I miss my guess, this is the first _direct_ seizure we've seen of ACTUAL missile hardware on a North Korean ship.